Pages

Friday, 10 April 2015

North East England enjoyed biggest rise in living standards since start of the recession, study finds

"People in the North East have enjoyed the biggest rise in living standards since the start of the recession, according to a new study." reports today's Independent Newspaper.

The report highlights "The surprising findings suggest that the North-South divide which existed at the start of the downturn is no longer so clear cut.

The 3.9 per cent rise in incomes in the North East since 2007-08 –worth £794 a year-- is due largely to jobs growth in the region. It will delight the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats as they try to answer Ed Miliband’s central election claim about a 'cost of living crisis'."

Incomes in the North East were the lowest in Britain on the eve of the recession. But the region’s employment rate is now 2.9 per cent higher than before the downturn and it had a relatively shallow pay squeeze – 6.1 per cent between 2009 and 2014, lower than the UK-wide figure of 9.3 per cent."

You can read the full article here:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/generalelection/north-east-england-enjoyed-biggest-rise-in-living-standards-since-start-of-the-recession-study-finds-10163268.html